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“Not bad. I suppose we’ll see how well it does against mine; tonight’s nightmare is not only my favorite, it’s my best.”
My heart sunk. That didn’t sound good. “Then why haven’t you woven it until tonight?”
Darius grinned. “While observing Maci this afternoon, I saw her discover a creature I’ve been anxious to use in my nightmares. Now that she knows what it is, I can.”
“You were watching Maci?”
“Nightmares are most effective when they touch on a Mortal’s experiences and fears,” he said. “The more I know about my Mortal, the more I’ll know what frightens her. The same is true with creating dreams. You should try it sometime if you ever finish raiding the Cultivating Fields of all its flowers.” Unlike the previous times he’d given me that jab, tonight his voice was teasing rather than hostile, and I couldn’t help but smile.
Things were going so well between Darius and me that I didn’t want to risk tumbling into my dream tonight, so after we’d dropped our quilts onto Maci, I clutched my weaving mirror, nearly pressing it against my nose.
This was the first dream I hadn’t copied but had instead tried to weave from my heart, and it turned out to be the strongest I’d ever created, despite it being my simplest one. A rainbow of bubbles of various sizes surrounded Maci, glistening as they rained from the sunlit sky. One by one they popped, triggering a trill of Maci’s favorite lullaby sung in her mother’s melodious voice. The dream was relatively short, but it felt peaceful and gentle. The dream slowly faded away as the last bubble burst and the lullaby’s final note played without any sign of having been interrupted by a nightmare.
Dream dust gathered in a shimmery cloud and swirled through the air to seep into my dream locket. I blinked. “Did I win?”
Darius gaped at my considerably fuller locket before grinning crookedly. “Looks like it.”
I beamed as the clear dust now harbored in my locket turned lilac, a symbol it was now mine. “I can’t believe it, I finally won. The invincible Darius actually lost.” I giggled and clasped my hands. Wow, what a rush.
But it was more than the thrill of finally beating Darius and taking one step closer to securing my place in the Dream World. Below us, Maci slept soundly, her expression content. Warmth, powerful and glowing, expanded from my heart. Maci had enjoyed my dream. It made my victory infinitely sweeter.
Darius chuckled at my exuberance. “Congratulations, Nemesis.” Then his grin vanished. “Comets, you beat me. What have I done? I hate losing.”
“Nonsense.” Bolt crawled out of Darius’s upright hair. “Only this morning you said you hoped tonight would be the night Eden finally—”
Darius pinched Bolt’s mouth shut, his cheeks crimson.
I dipped my finger inside my locket and lightly traced some dream dust along the spiderweb strands stretching from his eye. He stiffened beneath my fingertip before relaxing against my touch. “Thank you for your help. I couldn’t have done it without you.”
For a brief second Darius’s lips curved up, but the hinted smile almost immediately vanished before his usual serious expression returned. He cleared his throat. “I hope you realize I didn’t help you for your benefit, but for the necessity of maintaining the balance between the Dream and Nightmare Realms. Now that you know the basics, there’s no more need for my assistance.”
Bolt tsked from Darius’s shoulder. “Why won’t you admit you wanted to help her become a better Weaver?”
Darius whacked him, but instead of falling off his perch, Bolt gracefully hung by a silk thread, where he sent me another mischievous wink.
Just then I noticed my dream, a bubble of lavender light, floating above Maci’s cradle beside Darius’s olive swirl, which was shrinking rapidly for having not been viewed. Face still crimson, Darius glanced towards where I was watching. “What are you staring at?”
“Nothing.” I hastily looked away, but Darius’s nightmare floated closer and tauntingly bounced in my peripheral vision, its eerie glow luring my gaze like a moth to a flame. Just one peek wouldn’t hurt…no, I couldn’t give in, not in front of Darius.
But my curiosity lingered. Which nightmare had my dream finally beaten? Wouldn't it be invaluable to study it, if only to compare its strength against my own dream to aid me in future Weavings? After all, it wasn’t just any nightmare; Darius had claimed it was his favorite.
The nightmare floated closer. My eyes flickered back and forth between it and the ceiling.Don’t give in, don’t give in…but during one of my accidental glimpses, my gaze lingered too long. The familiar swoosh swept over me as I tumbled inside.
Maci’s bedroom had disappeared, swallowed up in an ocean of spiders, crawling across the cobwebs draped in a canopy over her cradle. Hundreds more covered the walls in swirling clouds of black. Although it was a tamer version of the nightmare Darius had given me due to it being absent Maci’s fear, the heart of the nightmare was the same as the one Darius had woven for me all those months ago.
I tried tugging myself free from my sticky prison but I was trapped. The spiders scurried closer until they were upon me, tickling my toes and infesting my hair, torturing me without escape from the never-ending agony of their pattering legs.
“Nemesis? Nemesis?” Darius’s frantic voice sounded from a great distance away, an echo that steadily grew louder and more desperate. “Eden?Eden?”
Abruptly, I jerked from the dream and found myself back in Maci’s spider-free bedroom. Darius held my shoulders in an iron grip, his eyes wide. “Snap out of it, Eden.”
I blinked, dazed, and relief flooded Darius’s face.
“You did it again. Tell me what happened. Now.”
I seemed to have lost the ability to speak, as if the nightmare’s cobwebs had filled my throat and blocked all sound. Darius’s fingers holding me felt eerily similar to the weight of the spiders’ legs.
“Get them off me.” I shook myself from his grip, but the sensation lingered. I frantically rubbed my arms, but I couldn’t shake off the horrible fear entangling me like I was still trapped within the nightmare’s tangled webs.
